Swift Magic (The Swift Codex Book 2) (27 page)

“What is that?”

“My gift for Rossalinda's family. I want you to deliver it for me.”

“Sure,” I said. “But, what's with the pages?”

“The pages?” Lyall held the book up for me, confused. “They're just regular old things.” Then he stared at me thoughtfully. “Sit here. I'll show you.”

So I sat next to him, putting space enough between us for the book to rest spread open. Lyall bent down, grabbed a fistful of grass, and dropped it on the book. After a second, he added a purple larkspur spike with a few flowers on it.

“I am going to make paper.”

“Just like this?”

“Just like this.” And he arranged the grass blades in one layer, put the flower at an angle, and he laid his hand down over the top, whispering words. He closed the book, counted to thirteen, and opened the book back up again. The grass blades were pressed into each other, dry and appearing to be brittle. Lyall reached into a pouch and sprinkled something over them.

“Dust from the roots of the Grandfather Tree by Lake Alarum,” he explained. Then he brandished the new page, picking it up and bending it this way and that. “And done. Here, you can have this pouch. Every fey needs a supply of Grandfather Tree Dust.”

“Thank you,” I said and tied it about my belt. “So, is the book special because you made it?”

Lyall's jaw dropped. “By the Will-o-the-Wisps, feyling, what would make you think that? No, it's because I'm going to do this.”

He put his hand on the first page, closed his eyes, and a flash happened under his palm. When he lifted it up, a three-dimensional illusion arose of a woman in a rocking chair with her husband by her side, cooing over a baby. I stared, uncomprehending at first, then I realized that the people in the illusion wore clothes more similar to Lyall's attire than to what the village currently wore.

“That was Rossalinda's birth?”

“My memory of her. I don't have many others of her in particular, mind you, but they should appreciate what I can give them.”

I cocked my head to the side, thinking. “Can I…do you mind if I, if I can, that is…”

“Spit it out.”

“Enchant the whole book so someone simply has to put their hand on it and remember her, to give an illusion like that?”

“I think it is possible. Whether or not you are able do it, I am not to say. I'll by all means donate the book to the cause, if you discover you can do it. It may be possible if you enchant a carrier oil and anoint the book with it. Let me show you how to do what I did. The rest is for you to accomplish.”

All I could do was nod. Lyall took my hand, put it palm-flat on a new page, and Lyall began to teach me a new way of casting an illusion while I dreaded mistakenly ruining his book.

Deceptively simple seemed to be the watchword of the Wildwoods. The spell Lyall taught me was in no way as easy as he made it seem, though that wasn't a surprise,. I managed to do as he had done, and projected a three-dimensional illusion of my memory of Rossalinda serving food and bantering with her mate onto a clean page. The real question was if I could enchant the whole book to do that in a flash…and if Rossalinda's family would find it a suitable gift for the funeral.

With a firm check on the exhaustion creeping into my healing body, I stood upright. Debating mentally if this would or would not work would get me no where. I just needed to follow through with it and see what happened.

I rubbed my eyes, scrubbing away the image of the Unwritten that Lyall had shown me branded into the trees. That was a subject to research into later, not now. According to Lyall, the spell had been there for some time and it hadn't changed, so it was doubtful that there would be an immediate evolution. I needed to take care of one item at a time.

“You have as good of a chance of the enchantment as anyone,” Lyall said. He put on his pack. “I bless you and your smelly old fire drake.”

I smiled. “I bless you and your smelly old feet.”

Lyall bowed and picked up his walking stick. “Well played. Find me when you know what to do with those trees.”

I would have replied, but he was already gone. He'd stepped behind a shrub and just evaporated into thin air. Around me the clearing buzzed with crickets and bees which were growing increasingly interested in me. I clutched the knobby shaft of my own walking stick and took a deep breath.

“To Aunt Linnia's.”

I turned around, took two steps onto the main trail, and nearly stumbled over my own feet when I saw her house right before me.

It hadn't been that long since I'd been to her home, but it seemed to have altered since then. The flowers were in full bloom, different flowers than before, of course. Today it was a desert southwest theme. Yuccas, all kinds of cacti, succulents whose names I didn't know, even a tree laden with pineapples, a gravel surface in between everything. Out of the sod-roofed cottage, a stream of smoke trickled up into the canopy of evergreens far overhead.

There was a rustling in the leaves just off to my side and I looked—and screamed. For a split-second I didn't know if I should run or charge with my walking stick as a club.

It had emerged from a side opening of the caves and glided silently up next to me. It had eight legs which were glossy except for the hairlike barbs on those spear like legs. Its body boasted a thin brown fur with a golden spot on its back. The eyes were multifaceted and lidless. It had mandibles the size of my forearms.

It hadn't been nearly so freaky in the caves.

The mouth wriggled open and shut, revealing a proboscis tube thing. I didn't know the anatomy of a spider that well besides what it had taken for me to pass middle-school science class, and I'd frankly forgotten most of that in the years since. I was now glad to have no idea what I was staring at.

“Reginald, go home,” came Aunt Linnia's voice as she approached from the main opening of the caves. The spider paused, like a dog who was told to leave a visitor alone, and retreated through shrubs to stop in front of Aunt Linnia. “There you are,” Aunt Linnia said, scratching the spider on its hairy body.

Aunt Linnia had been in to harvest spider silk and now had bundles of it cast over her back, the raw silk shining and golden in the sunlight. I watched in awe as 'Reginald' bent low and went through the open door to the spider's cave. Her stray spider successfully contained, Aunt Linnia locked the door and greeted me.

“We are doing a siesta today. What will you have? There's Long Island iced tea, blue curacao, tequila…a bit of everything.”

“The blue stuff,” I said, embarrassed to not be able to pronounce it. “Aunt Linnia…what was the spider doing out?”

“Oh, Reginald. He gets restless, so I let him go for a walk. He's harmless and very friendly. The poor thing doesn't understand why people run away screaming from him. Terrible scene when he tries to comfort them.” Aunt Linnia shook her head at the memory. “I'm glad you didn't do that.”

By the time we were sitting down on the porch with drinks in hand, it was dusk. Aunt Linnia played a flute which called Will-o-the-Wisps out of the Wildwoods, and those lights darted this way and that to the tune of the music which had continued even after Aunt Linnia put the instrument down on the table. There were the hoots of owls and chatters from squirrels or chipmunks in the trees beyond our lit area.

The normalcy of reclining in a chair with a drink and chatty company overcame my earlier unease. Soon we were talking about anything and everything. Time was endless and the sunset remained in dusky hues between the branches by the time we came to the reason for my visit.

My voice was sore from talking and my body felt leaden. After the booze had relaxed my muscles, remaining awake took great effort. I shifted so I had an easier time looking at Aunt Linnia while I explained the encounter with Lyall and the book. Of the Unwritten, I said almost nothing, leaving it as a topic for later. Aunt Linnia thought about the oil and enchantment with a fresh martini held aloft, mindlessly examining it against the Will-o-the-Wisps.

“It is possible…you could put the same enchantment on the oil that you would usually put on the page, and then spritz the pages of the book with the oil, and the pages will absorb it. It won't be the book which is enchanted, but for all purposes, it should work.”

“All I ask is that people put the hand on it, think of a memory, and bam, there's an illusion.”

Aunt Linnia nodded, now twirling the stem of her glass between thumb and forefinger. “Sure. It should work like that. My husband and I can test it first and fine-tune the enchantment before we put the oil on the book.”

I breathed easier, surprised by how great of a relief I felt. Was I more worried about ruining Lyall's book, about failing with the enchantment, or about failing with Rossalinda's family? I wasn't sure.

“Do you think it's a good idea? I mean, I can't bring her back, obviously, but do you think this is a sensitive gift?”

Aunt Linnia smiled. “You are giving them a way to collect and share cherished memories during a time when they are supposed to be reflecting on a life well-lived. Of course it's a sweet keepsake.”

“Alright.”

“But we'd best get on to it. They will be ready for private services soon. Do you know what you need?”

I touched the book and recalled what Lyall and I had talked about. “Carrier oil, the book, and I don't know what else.”

Aunt Linnia sipped her margarita. “You'll also need a non-reactive pot, a little bit of gentle heat to help the enchantment sink in better, and something to spray the oil with.”

“Yes, I would.”

“I have all of that, naturally. There's a fondue pot which will work for the heating and I have one of those monstrous perfume bottles which was used as a display piece for a department store I used to work for back when you were this high,” Aunt Linnia said and motioned to her hip.

She got up and I followed, careful where I placed my feet so I wouldn't trip and embarrass myself. In no time we were in the greenhouse addition to her home. At the patio-like floors and twelve foot high tomato plants, I was struck by how similar it was to my own sun room. I didn't have long to think about it, though, before Linnia led me to a secretary desk which folded down to reveal cubbies filled to the brim with essential oils in green, brown, pink, and purple bottles. Each was labeled in Aunt Linnia's swirling scrawl.

One by one, Aunt Linnia found and placed the fondue pot, the perfume bottle, and a plastic jug of canola cooking oil on the desk. I stared at the canola oil in its crinkled container, then shrugged. Try as they might, the two worlds could hardly keep themselves isolated. The oil was a reminder of the conveniences of the modern technology world, and it was for the best that I accepted its boons along with the rest of the magical world.

I went over once more how Lyall had taught me to do the illusion, and demonstrated it on a fresh page. Unlike me, Aunt Linnia grasped the concept in a flash and had an illusion at the first try. Within ten seconds, actually. I tried not to be envious. I failed. This was what I got for getting too proud of my abilities among people who didn't have practice with illusions, I reminded myself.

Aunt Linnia nodded. “So,” she said, “how much oil do you think it would take to give each leaf a light spritz?”

“Less than a tablespoon. That would soak it through. A teaspoon? Less than that? And there's about what, a hundred and some leaves in the book?”

“A hundred and thirty by the feel of it. Let's say a half-teaspoon per leaf. That's…a little under five and a half cups of oil.”

I imagined putting five cups of oil on the book. It would be positively swimming in it. “That seems like a lot.”

“It does,” Aunt Linnia said. “Let's start out with two cups and be scarce with it. If we have spare oil, I'll keep some and you'll keep some.”

“Let's do it.”

Aunt Linnia's measuring cups happened to be nothing else than a glass beaker like I'd used in science class, except it measured out liquids, flour, sugar, and I didn't get to read the last label before Aunt Linnia was done measuring and dumped the oil into the fondue pot. She lit a candle with a short spell, and then stood there with her fingers near the heat.

“Now, you put your hand in the oil and do the spell Lyall told you, but don't complete it by putting a memory to it. Just repeat the spell over and over until the oil starts to feel uncomfortably hot. Stir it, too, to get a uniform heating.”